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Nicol Spence Galbraith

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Nicol Spence Galbraith
Born17 March 1927
Southborough, Kent
Died7 August 2008
Education
OccupationEpidemiologist
Known for
Medical career
ProfessionPhysician
FieldPublic health
Institutions
Awards

Nicol Spence Galbraith (17 March 1927 – 7 August 2008), was a British physician in public health, and founding director of the Central Public Health Laboratory Service (PHLS) Communicable Disease Surveillance Centre (CDSC). The results of his efforts were demonstrated in 1978, when he represented the PHLS following the smallpox outbreak in Birmingham. Five years later he warned the government of contaminated blood products.

In 1958 Galbraith joined the Epidemiological Research Laboratory of the Central PHLS, Colindale, which at the time was part of the Medical Research Council (MRC). After five years of working with vaccine trials, polio vaccine safety, and monitoring of food bourne disease, he was appointed deputy medical officer of health for Newham, east London, and in 1974 became the area medical officer. In 1976 he re-joined the PHLS and as director of the CDSC, set up teaching courses for NHS epidemiologists, and improved surveillance programmes in infectious disease.

In 1991 Galbraith was awarded the Jenner Medal of the Royal Society of Medicine, and in 1994 he delivered the John Snow Society's Pumphandle Lecture.

Early life and education[edit]

Nicol Galbraith was born in Southborough, Kent, on 17 March 1927, to Samuel Nicol Galbraith, the then medical officer of health for south west Kent.[1] He completed his early education at Tonbridge School, before gaining a place at London University to study medicine, and subsequently qualified in 1950 from Guy's Hospital.[1][2]

Early career[edit]

Galbraith completed house officer posts at Lewisham Hospital and Guy's.[1] In 1952 he enlisted with the Royal Army Medical Corps (RAMC) to do his National Service.[1] The following year he was posted to Egypt, where he served as deputy assistant director of army health, based at the Suez Canal zone.[1][2] There, he had to attend to a paratyphoid B fever outbreak.[1][2] In 1954 he gained the diploma in public health after completing studies at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (LSHTM).[1]

In 1958, after four years of house jobs at Brook General Hospital and the Lewisham Hospital, Galbraith joined the Epidemiological Research Laboratory of the Central Public Health Laboratory Service (PHLS), Colindale, which at the time was part of the Medical Research Council (MRC).[1][2] He remained there as an epidemiologist for five years.[2] There, his work involved looking at vaccine trials, polio vaccine safety, and monitoring of food bourne disease.[1] In 1963, he was appointed deputy medical officer of health for Newham, east London. The following year he made his first call for a national epidemiological service that would be centrally co-ordinated.[2] In 1974 he became the area medical officer of the City and East London Area Health Authority.[1][2][a] During that time, he continued work on polio and BCG vaccines, and called for a centrally funded co-ordinated national epidemiological service, based on the American Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), having first published on the case in 1968, in an article titled "Epidemiology and the Green Paper – a National Epidemiological Service".[1][4][5]

Later career[edit]

In 1976 Galbraith re-joined the PHLS after being asked to establish a national unit that could report and control communicable disease.[1][4] The following year he became the founding director of the Communicable Disease Surveillance Centre (CDSC), administered by the Central Public Health Laboratory Service (PHLS), and chose the Broad Street pump as its logo.[2][6] That year, he visited Alexander Langmuir at the CDC in Atlanta and subsequently began expanding the CDSC.[4][7] As director of the CDSC, he set up teaching courses for NHS epidemiologists, and improved surveillance programmes in infectious disease.[1] The weekly bulletin was his creation.[8] At the same time, he lectured at St Bartholomew's Hospital Medical School and at the LSHTM.[1]

1978 smallpox outbreak in Birmingham[edit]

Main article: 1978 smallpox outbreak in the United Kingdom

The results of Galbraith's efforts as director of the CDSC were demonstrated in 1978, when he represented the PHLS following the smallpox outbreak in Birmingham, attending the initial meeting at Birmingham area Health Authority's headquarters along with Alasdair Geddes, Surinder S. Bakhkshi, William Nicol, and Henry Bedson.[9][10] He transferred a few epidemiologists to Birmingham and confirmed that testing would be done at the Colindale laboratory.[9] In 1981, he was unsuccessful in his call for a local surveillance system comprising of a clinical epidemiologist.[8][11]

Contaminated blood scandal[edit]

Main article: Contaminated blood scandal in the United Kingdom

On 9 May 1983, after reviewing literature revealing that 11 cases of AIDS in the United States, three in Spain, and one in Wales, were detected in people who had received American Factor VIII, Galbraith wrote to Ian Field of the UK health department:[12][13]

I have reviewed the literature and come to the conclusion that all blood products made from blood donated in the USA after 1978 should be withdrawn from use until the risk of AIDS transmission by these products has been clarified.[14][12]

Other[edit]

In 1986 Galbraith conributed to the founding of the British Paediatric Surveillance Unit, which functioned to detect new disease in children.[2] A vaccine advocate, he developed a way to examine risks of live polio vaccine, and was able to show the safety and efficacy of giving the BCG, diphtheria-tetanus, and oral polio vaccines at the same time.[2] At the CDSC he created an immunisation department for monitoring vaccine safety, efficacy, and coverage.[2]

Awards and honours[edit]

For his efforts as area medical officer in east London, Galbraith was made Freedom of the City of London in 1976.[1] He was elected president of the Epidemiology and Community Medicine Section of the Royal Society of Medicine.[1][when?] In 1991 he was awarded the RSM's Jenner Medal, and in 1994 he delivered the John Snow Society's Pumphandle Lecture.[1][6][15]

Personal and family[edit]

Galbraith married Zina-Mary née Cullingworth Flood, in 1952. They had three daughters.[1] At a young age, due to severe rheumatoid arthritis, he had two hip replacements.[2]

Galbraith died on 7 August 2008, following a heart attack.[2]

Selected publications[edit]

Articles[edit]

Books[edit]

  • Infection. London: Grant McIntyre. 1982.
  • Dr John Snow: his Early Years. London: The Royal Institute of Public Health. 2002.

Notes[edit]

  1. ^ A post created following the re-organisation of the NHS on 1 April 1974. Local authorities in health were abolished, and area health authorities introduced.[3]

References[edit]

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r "Nicol Spence Galbraith | RCP Museum". history.rcplondon.ac.uk. Archived from the original on 25 May 2022. Retrieved 20 June 2024.
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Bartlett, Christopher; Galbraith, Sarah (7 May 2009). "Spence Galbraith". BMJ. 338: b1827. doi:10.1136/bmj.b1827. ISSN 0959-8138.
  3. ^ Jonas, Steven; Banta, David (1 December 1975). "The 1974 reorganization of the British National Health Service: An analysis". Journal of Community Health. 1 (2): 91–105. doi:10.1007/BF01319203. ISSN 1573-3610.
  4. ^ a b c Kirchhelle, Claas (17 June 2022). "Giants on Clay Feet—COVID-19, infection control and public health laboratory networks in England, the USA and (West-)Germany (1945–2020)". Social History of Medicine. 35 (3): 703–748. doi:10.1093/shm/hkac019. ISSN 0951-631X. PMC 9384317. PMID 36046218.
  5. ^ Galbraith, N.S. (December 1968). "Epidemiology and the Green Paper – a National Epidemiological Service". The Lancet. 292 (7582): 1339–1340. doi:10.1016/S0140-6736(68)91831-X.
  6. ^ a b Stanwell-Smith, Rosalind (December 2003). "Cholera, Chloroform, and the Science of Medicine: a Life of John Snow". Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine. 96 (12): 612–613. ISSN 0141-0768. PMC 539667.
  7. ^ Pollock, George (2012). "6. A need for damage limitation". An Epidemiological Odyssey: The Evolution of Communicable Disease Control. Springer. pp. 67–68. ISBN 978-94-007-3997-0.
  8. ^ a b Pollock, George (2003). "3. Surveillance". Fevers and Cultures: Lessons for Surveillance, Prevention and Control. CRC Press. p. 1994. ISBN 978-1-857-75583-1.
  9. ^ a b Great Britain. Parliament. House of Commons (1979). Parliamentary Papers, House of Commons and Command. H.M. Stationery Office. pp. 70–74.
  10. ^ Shooter, R. A. (22 July 1980). Report of the investigation into the cause of the 1978 Birmingham smallpox occurrence (PDF). London: Her Majesty's Stationary Office. Archived from the original (PDF) on 31 May 2024.
  11. ^ Lancaster, James; Allyson, Pollock (2022). A supplementary report into structures and funding of the communicable disease control system by Dr James Lancaster and Professor Allyson Pollock - 15 Nov 2022 | Infected Blood Inquiry (PDF). Archived from the original on 24 June 2024.
  12. ^ a b "Preliminary Report Chapter 8: HIV and AIDS". www.penroseinquiry.org.uk. Archived from the original on 19 April 2023. Retrieved 21 June 2024.
  13. ^ "Letter from N S Galbraith to Carol Grayson - 14 Apr 2008 | Infected Blood Inquiry" (PDF). www.infectedbloodinquiry.org.uk. Archived from the original on 25 June 2024. Retrieved 25 June 2024.
  14. ^ Coombes, Rebecca (28 April 2007). "Bad blood". BMJ (Clinical research ed.). 334 (7599): 879–880. doi:10.1136/bmj.39195.621528.59. ISSN 1756-1833. PMC 1857798. PMID 17463458.
  15. ^ "1994 Dr Spence Galbraith: Dr John Snow - Early Life and Later Triumphs". The John Snow Society. 9 September 1994. Archived from the original on 23 June 2024. Retrieved 21 June 2024.

Further reading[edit]

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